Pushed On
by writeinspiredraw
Summary: It's been five years since Gene sent Alex into the Railway Arms and that's been far too long for them to be apart. Cue the one person that can possibly make Gene be pushed into moving on from his kingdom and into the Railway Arms with the woman he loves.


**(A/N): Wow, it has been forever since I have written a fic, let alone continued any. But I am avoiding a Master's dissertation and something kind of hit me again that I should get back into writing. In that sense, I will be attempting to finish all my previous fics, I swear, but I take the muses and prompts as they come to me. So that being said, enjoy my first real effort in nearly a year, or years in some cases. Obviously I do not own Ashes to Ashes, otherwise there would have been a third instalment with Gene going into the Railway Arms to Alex and the others. Still, enjoy and as always let me know what you think. Rating is due to language contained in the fic, mainly Gene's own thoughts.**

**Enjoy!**

**Pushed On**

Gene Hunt sighed as he settled back into his desk, whisky in hand and a scowl on his face. He'd just sent the latest div in a long, _long_ line of idiots through to the pub, the beyond, whatever anyone wanted to call it. Rubbing the back of his neck with his free hand, he sighed again. God, he was getting too old for all this. _But then_, a little voice reminded him snarkily, a voice he knew all too well, _you wouldn't feel like this if you had someone to share it with_. Ruthlessly, he pushed the voice from his head. He couldn't even get a rest from his pain in the arse DI, _ex-DI_, even after he'd forced her through into the Railway Arms just over five years previously. It was nearing the end of the 1980s and though he'd never admit it to another person, he was lonely. He missed her. Alex. Alex Drake. His Bolly. The doors to the squadroom burst open, signalling the arrival of yet another lost soul he had to drag around until they put whatever demons they had to bed and he could push them at the boozer. He got to his feet, readying himself mentally for whatever spew of insanity would come his way from the newcomer. Surprisingly, he'd not received transfer papers, but then he reasoned, there were piles of paperwork on his desk awaiting his attention. He stepped out of his office only to stop short.

The woman stood in the middle of the room was only about mid-twenties, with dark hair curled loosely to her shoulders, not much in style with the large perms and backcombed hair that was all the rage, but it suited her, Gene noted absentmindedly. She was of an average height, around five foot five, wearing a pair of leggings with an oversized jumper. She was looking round in obvious confusion, but it was her words that had caused Gene to stop short.

"No, it can't be. This was… a dream, no, it had to be."

"Can I help you, luv?" Gene asked, uncharacteristically kindly, if the reaction of the rest of his new team was anything to go by. The voice of the mystery woman was somewhat familiar but unfamiliar at the same time. The woman turned to face him and he sucked in air in shock. Her eyes. They were Alex's eyes, but this woman was not Alex. He'd know Alex at any point in time, no matter her age.

"I… I don't know." The woman paused, looking at the empty desk in the squadroom, still with the epaulette numbers embedded into its' frame, Gene refusing to get rid of his Bolly's desk, going so far as to ban everyone from sitting at it, a shrine to 1983 and happier times. None of his team understood it, but they knew not to go near it. The woman, however, moved in on the desk like it was a homing beacon, gently picking up the nameplate still depicting 'DI Drake'. Gene strode over, ready to lash out at the woman, only to stop short for the second time in as many minutes as he heard her speak. "Mummy?"

Gene's eyes widened. No, it couldn't be… He nearly laughed as his first thought was that if it was who he thought it was, Alex would kill him. Still, he needed to make sure. What was the name Alex clung to like a lifeline for three years? Oh yeah. "Molly?"

Her eyes quickly darted to his, her fingers never letting go of the nameplate. "How… what?" Her eyes strayed behind him to the office she'd seen him stride out of, his name proudly displayed on the glass. "You… you're Gene Hunt." And she promptly fainted.

"My reputation has got to stop preceding me," Gene muttered, reaching down to scoop up the young woman, making a slight note that she was a little lighter than the last woman he'd carried in this fashion, eight years ago. However, instead of carrying her into the room, he carried her out and straight down to the first aid bay that had been installed a couple of years earlier at one of his newcomer's insistence, kicking the door open and laying her gently on the medical bed. A few moments was all he had to wait as she began to come round, bizarrely looking comforted by the unfamiliar surroundings. Gene leant against the side of the bed, awaiting her registering his presence.

"Molly?" He asked again gently.

She nodded slightly. "Gene?"

He nodded in return, blinking in surprise as she reached up to cup his cheek in one of her slender, cold hands. "Why're you here Molls?" He asked almost gruffly, the nickname he'd heard from Alex slipping out without thought.

"I… I don't know." Molly shrugged, looking slightly terrified. "I don't remember much. Just that there was a guy, talking to Evan, which I thought was weird because I haven't spoken to Evan in ages, telling him he was sending me to be with my mum. Then I felt pain here," she palmed the back of her head, "and I ended up outside the station. I came in to see if anyone would help me and found myself here."

Gene fought the urge to swear, or smoke. He'd been trying to cut down on the fags, and the voice of his Bolly in his head chastised him. _Don't you smoke or swear in front of my little girl, Gene_. "You're in 1989 Molly." He told her gently, once more surprised at her response.

"1989? But, last time it was 1983."

"Wait, what?"

Molly glanced around, curling herself up into a ball, arms around her knees and looking like the scared child Gene assumed she looked like when she'd lost Alex. "I… I was here. I'd seen you. My mum. She'd talk to me all the time, hand me things, show me things. Sometimes I could wander this station. I thought it was all a dream, well mostly."

"Mostly?"

"Well, my mum told me about Evan, the twat, and her mum and what had happened to her parents because of that. I thought it was a dream, and I forgot for a while, but when I was twenty two I remembered about it and so I asked Evan about it. It was true, all of it, what she'd told me." Molly had a couple of tears trailing down her face and Gene put an arm around her shoulders gently, a lot more things about Alex's first year with him making much more sense now. Why she'd been so obsessed with the Prices and Evan _bloody_ White. Her breakdown at the explosion. Why she hadn't looked at little Alex Price when he'd carried her into the station.

"Alright, Molls, its alright." Gene fished a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her, his other arm still round her shoulders. "So, why would you be sent here now? I'm not being funny luv but you're not even supposed to be born for a few years yet." Normally, he wouldn't talk about the future with any of his newcomers, but something was telling him he could with Molly. Maybe it was her relation to the woman he still loved, even after so long. "What unfinished business could you possibly have right now?"

Molly sniffled as she finished wiping her eyes carefully with Gene's handkerchief. "I went somewhere else before here. Bright lights, tunnel, all of that." She pursed her lips distastefully and Gene fought the urge to smirk, having seen that look on her mother's face too many times to count and felt sorry for the poor sod that had had to speak to the littlest Drake before she'd reached him. He'd never heard of a newcomer going somewhere else before being sent to himself though. "I know I'm dead, you don't have to try and shield me from that."

"Yer mum's gonna kill me." Gene muttered, causing Molly to laugh.

"No, she won't. I knew when I was kidnapped from work that I wouldn't make it back. That's not important. My unfinished business actually coincides with yours, Gene." Molly smirked at his confused look. "I always worried about my mum, and it didn't stop when she died. See, thanks to my wandering of this place as a teenager, I figured she was living in this world, at least subconsciously. I saw you with her too, y'know," she added knowingly. Gene fought the urge to blush, ignoring that a young woman had such power over him, no matter who that was.

"Molly, listen, I, uh…"

"You love her. It's okay."

"Well, I, she'd pick you every time, y'know. You're her kid. I'd never make her choose."

"I'd never make her choose either, don't worry. I knew she loved you back in the hospital. She only ever said one word before she left me. 'Gene'. Of course, Evan wondered what woman she knew called Jean, but I'd been here already in my dreams and thought she was talking about you." Molly shrugged. "Even in my childish mind, I wanted her happy, here with you. She would have had no life even if she'd made it back to me. I knew that."

"So, uh, you don't mind?"

"You and my mum? No, you guys are quite sweet together."

"The manc lion does _not_ do _sweet_!"

Molly's smirk only widened at his rebuttal. "I'm here Gene, because my unfinished business is to see my mum happy."

"Molls, she went on from here, she is happy."

"No she's not. She hasn't got you."

"Molly, no, I… I'm needed here. All those lost souls-"

"Are no longer your responsibility," Molly finished for him sadly, handing him her warrant card softly. He opened it up to find a picture of the young woman before him with the name of 'DCI Molly Drake'. "It's my turn."

…

"I don't think I can do this." Gene paced in front of the pub, not daring to go in. Molly stood quietly by his side, watching his pacing with compassion. He couldn't deny that she'd replace him brilliantly, but he was conflicted. Not for the reason the littlest Drake was thinking either, that he didn't want to give up his kingdom. No, he was conflicted because he wanted Alex to have her daughter back, to have her Molly, but he also wanted to be with Alex again. He'd already felt the power he'd had in this world leave him, so he knew it was his time, but he wanted Alex to have the one person she'd been fighting so damn hard to get back to.

Molly watched him for several minutes before both their attention was caught by the door to the Railway Arms opening from the inside and a woman they both knew stepping out of the pub with a wide smile.

"Mummy!"

"Alex!"

Gene held back as Molly rushed into her mother's arms, tears streaming down Alex's face as she held her baby girl as close as possible. "Molls, Molly, sweetheart." Alex pulled back slightly to stare at her daughter's face, older than she remembered. "What are you doing here? This isn't the place for you, sweetheart."

"I'm already dead there mum, Arthur Layton finished us all off." Molly shrugged slightly at Alex's pained cry, not sure what to do and turning to Gene with a questioning glance. Gene strode up and placed his hand on Alex's cheek gently.

"No crying, Bolly Kecks, that's an order."

"Gene." Alex practically launched herself into his arms, weirdly reminiscent of the last time they'd both been outside that particular pub.

"Bolls."

"Right here folks." Molly pointed out with a slight laugh as they immediately pulled back, though they'd only been hugging each other tightly. Alex instantly looked guiltily at her daughter, Gene fighting back a smirk. Molly was definitely more like her mother than either would ever let on, including a wicked, if weird, sense of humour. "Don't worry mum, I like him for you."

"Molls." Alex wrapped her daughter up in a tight hug once again, burying her face in Molly's curls.

"It'll be alright mum. I was with you the whole time you were here, I promise." Molly pulled back to look her mum in the eyes. "I have a job to do, but you can have Gene here come back through with you."

"No, Molls, I just got you back."

"I'm twenty-five mum, I think it's about time I lived on my own don't you?" Molly gave her a watery smile. Gene watched them both solemnly, sensing that he didn't need to say anything at this point, that it was up to Molly. "Listen mum, you need to be happy, which is why I'm here. To give you Gene, so you can be happy." She held up a hand to forestall her mother's protestations. "I'm going to stay here a while, find my own happiness, life, and then eventually I'll step through that door too and we can all be together forever. But until then, you get a life with Gene, together."

"Molls…" Alex wiped her eyes on the back of her hands. She knew her daughter made sense but she didn't want her to. "… you promise?"

"We can blow the candles out together." Molly promised, knowing her mother got the message.

"I'll make you a birthday crumble." Alex managed with a watery laugh. Molly turned to Gene.

"Look after my mum."

"Is that an order Little Molls?"

"Most definitely."

"Consider it done then, a promise from the Gene Genie."

"Thank you." Molly launched herself at Gene, hugging him tightly, which he returned awkwardly, not used to young women launching themselves at him like that. Alex watched in slight amusement as Molly ended the hug and stepped back.

"I've got to go now, but know that I love you so much mum."

"I love you too Molly. Remember you promised."

"I know, see you soon mum," she turned to Gene with a genuine smile, "dad."

Both watched in shock as Molly climbed into the silver Mercedes that Gene had bought after the Quattro's demise and drove away with a wave in the rear view mirror.

"Did she just call me dad?" Gene managed to blurt out a couple of minutes after she'd left.

"She did," Alex replied, in just as much shock. The shock turned to a smirk however as she turned to him. "Who knew it would take my daughter to push us together in the end, eh Guv?"

Gene returned the smirk as he pulled her close and grabbed her breast in a mimicry of their first real day together. "So Bollinger knickers, are you going to kiss me or punch me?"

"Oh, definitely the former, but we should probably move off the road for it." She gestured back to the Railway Arms. Gene slipped his hand from her breast to round her waist.

"After you then, Bolly kecks. We've got forever together, apparently."

"Oh, I'm sure we'll find some way to pass the time."

**The End.**


End file.
